WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A virus that typically causes a mild
infection killed at least five babies in the United States last
year, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said
on Thursday.

The virus was involved in an unusually high number of
severe infections in newborns last year, but the CDC said it
was not certain of the reason.

Coxsackievirus B1, or CVB1, is part of a group of viruses
called enteroviruses. It usually does not cause serious
infections but can cause more severe and potentially
life-threatening illness in newborns.

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The CDC's Steve Oberste, who headed a laboratory that
helped track the infections, said tens of thousands of children
are infected with this virus annually. He said people should
probably not be very concerned about the virus and also said
there is no sign it has mutated into a more dangerous form.

The virus killed two babies in California and one in
Illinois, Colorado and New Mexico. There may have been more
deaths that that the CDC did not know about, Oberste said.

All five newborns had symptoms of the virus within the
first week of life, and in four of the cases, there was
evidence of possible mother-to-infant transmission of the
virus, the CDC said.

"CVB1-associated deaths are reported rarely, and had not
been reported previously" to the formal enterovirus
surveillance system in place since 1970, the agency said.

"The enteroviruses don't cause much disease. Probably less
than 1 percent of all infections result in any illness at all.
And an even smaller percentage are serious illness. They're
mostly quite mild," Oberste said.

There is no specific treatment for this infection. Usual
symptoms include fever, respiratory problems and sore throat.
It can be spread in ways including sneezing or by touching
contaminated fecal matter.

"Health-care providers and public health departments should
be vigilant to the possibility of neonatal disease caused by
CVB1," the CDC said.